The numbers: In October, the prices of foreign goods went back up, which made U.S. inflation a little higher. This was mostly due to higher fuel prices.
Last month, the measure of import prices went up 0.3%.
The Wall Street Journal asked economists and found that they thought the economy would drop by 0.1% in October, following a much bigger drop in September.
The government said that import prices went up 0.2% last month if energy is taken out of the picture.
Important facts: In October, fuel prices went up 1.5%, partly making up for a 7.5% drop the month before.
But since oil prices are going down again, the cost of imports probably won’t make a big difference in U.S. inflation over the next few months. In the past year, import prices have only gone up by 0.8%.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) fell 0.70 percent and the S&P 500 (SPX) fell 1.32 percent on Friday.
